[Tesco]

‘Napkin’ derives from the word ‘nape’, the Old French word for a tablecloth or towel, that originally comes from the Latin word for map, ‘mappa’, and ‘kin’ is the word for ‘little’ in Middle English.

Early napkins are believed to have originated as slices of a type of bread, used by those from ancient Greece; ancient Chinese used paper; while ancient Romans are said to have used cloth, that eventually became popular by the 1500s